Hell Gate: The 10-Year Plan to Blow Up New York's Most Dangerous Reef

On 10 October 1885 the US Army fired 282,730 pounds of explosive packed into four miles of tunnel under New York's East River. An eleven-year-old girl pressed the key. We read General Newton's 1867 report, the Army's own accounts and the newspapers of both blasts to find out why it took eighteen years, and which famous claims about it hold up. CHAPTERS 0:00 The ten-year bet 1:50 The Gate: One Ship in Fifty 4:23 Road A: Blast It From Above 7:56 Road B: Go Underneath 10:23 The Test: Hallett's Point, 1876 14:18 Four Miles Under Flood Rock 19:10 What the Shock Reached 22:33 The Bill and the Myths SOURCES L. F. Vernon-Harcourt, "Blasting Operations at Hell Gate, New York", Min. Proc. ICE vol. 85 (1886): https://archive.org/details/blastingo... J. Newton, Survey at Hell Gate, East River, H.R. Ex. Doc. 90, 39th Cong. 2d Sess. (1867): https://archive.org/details/letterfro... Report of the operations of the U.S. steam drilling-scow in the removal of Way's Reef (1875): https://archive.org/details/reportofo... Memorial of the Chamber of Commerce of New York on Hell Gate (1849): https://archive.org/details/memorialo... Annual Reports of the Chief of Engineers, 1886, 1888, 1894 (Hell Gate): https://archive.org/details/annualrep... · https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_S5... · https://archive.org/details/annualrep... New-York Tribune, 25 Sep 1876 and 11 Oct 1885; The Sun, 11 Oct 1885 (Library of Congress, Chronicling America) Science vol. 6 (23 Oct and 13 Nov 1885): https://archive.org/details/jstor-176... · https://archive.org/details/jstor-176... J. Newton, "The Destruction of Flood Rock", Popular Science Monthly, Feb 1886; Scientific American, 30 Sep 1876 and 10 and 17 Oct 1885 Messines 1917: Holt & Holt (2014); Turner (2010); Imperial War Museums IMAGES (all public domain or CC0; each is credited on screen; full list in the pinned comment) Library of Congress; NOAA Office of Coast Survey; Scientific American (1876, 1885); Popular Science Monthly (1886); Internet Archive scans of the 1867–1894 Army reports; Wikimedia Commons Music: "Singularity" and "False Vacuum Decay" by The Grey Room / Density & Time (YouTube Audio Library; no attribution required) ABOUT THIS VIDEO Archival images are public domain or used under the licences listed above. Builder's Plate tells the stories of the forgotten machines, materials, methods and people that built the modern world, from the original drawings, patents and reports. Spotted an error? Leave a comment with a source and we will pin the correction. #HellGate #EngineeringHistory #NewYorkHistory